Peregrine Semiconductor

- Peregrine Semiconductor is a fabless provider of high performance radio frequency integrated circuits, or RFICs. Our solutions leverage our proprietary UltraCMOS™ technology, which enables the design, manufacture, and integration of multiple RF, mixed-signal, and digital functions on a single chip. Our products deliver what we believe is an industry leading combination of performance and monolithic integration, and target a broad range of applications in the aerospace and defense, broadband, industrial, mobile wireless device, test and measurement equipment, and wireless infrastructure markets. UltraCMOS technology combines the ability to achieve the high levels of performance of traditional specialty processes, with the fundamental benefits of standard CMOS, the most widely used semiconductor process technology. More...

UltraCMOS technology utilizes a synthetic sapphire substrate, a near-perfect electrical insulator, providing low parasitic capacitance and enabling high signal isolation and excellent broadband linearity. These attributes result in RF devices with excellent high-frequency performance and power handling performance, reduced crosstalk between frequencies, and enhanced network efficiency. We have engineered design advancements, including our patented HaRP™ technology which significantly improves harmonic and linearity performance, and our patent-pending DuNE™ technology, a circuit design technique that we have used to develop our advanced digitally tunable capacitor (DTC) products. We offer a broad portfolio of high performance RFICs including switches, digital attenuators, frequency synthesizers, mixers and prescalers, and are developing power amplifiers (PAs), DTCs, and DC-DC converters. Our products are sold worldwide through our direct sales and field applications engineering staff and our network of independent sales representatives and distribution partners. Additional information is available on the Company website at www.psemi.com.Less...

More about Peregrine SemiconductorPeregrine Semiconductor is a supplier of the industry's most advanced RF and mixed-signal communications ICs which are ideally suited for the wireless infrastructure and mobile wireless; broadband CATV/DTV; communications infrastructure; and high-reliability markets. Manufactured on the Company’s proprietary UltraCMOS™ mixed-signal process technology, Peregrine products are uniquely poised to meet the needs of a global RF design community in high-growth applications such as WCDMA, EDGE and GSM digital cellular and mobile TV; broadband communications such as DTV/PCTV/DVR and telecom infrastructure; and in high-reliability applications such as industrial, automotive, military and satellite systems. Peregrine’s products feature monolithic integration and ease-of-development, which are essential to timely and cost-effective application design by our customers. Peregrine UltraCMOS devices are manufactured through strategic relationships with world-class CMOS foundries located in Australia, Asia and Japan. The Company, headquartered in San Diego, California, maintains global sales support operations and a worldwide technical distribution network.

From GSM cellular handsets, CDMA digital cellular and RIM devices, to CATV/DTV/DVR and other high-growth wireless broadband applications, engineers in the RF market space push to develop more efficient, less costly designs.As well, space and defense programs including satellites with rad-hard requirements, have become paramount to the safety and security of all nations. As these designs evolve, so too does the RF signal chain, which has long been seen as one of the more complex parts of the design…until now.

Peregrine’s unique, patented UltraCMOS™ silicon-on-sapphire process technology allows us to design and manufacture products for the mobile wireless and wireless infrastructure; broadband communications; space, defense and avionics markets with a level of RF performance that is unmatched in the industry.

UltraCMOS™ Technology

UltraCMOS™ mixed signal process technology is a proprietary, patented variation of silicon on-insulator (SOI) technology. It is the first commercially qualified use of Ultra Thin-Silicon (UTSi®) on sapphire substrates with high yields and competitive costs.

The greatest asset of the UltraCMOS process lies in its unprecedented ability to combine high-performance RF, mixed signal, passive elements, nonvolatile memory and digital functions on a single chip. Customers have validated the cost and performance advantage of UltraCMOS over competing mixed signal processes--GaAs, SiGe and bulk silicon CMOS--in applications where RF performance, low power, and integration are paramount. In addition, because UltraCMOS products are fabricated in a standard high volume CMOS wafer fabrication facility, our products and our customers benefit from the fundamental cost effectiveness and high yields, scalability and integration of CMOS, while achieving the performance of SiGe and GaAs. In addition, since sapphire is a near perfect insulator, UltraCMOS-based products can integrate high quality passive devices directly into the ICs, offering unprecedented levels of RF integration and cost effectiveness.

Products

Since its inception, Peregrine Semiconductor has focused its engineering resources on designing RF ICs which deliver best-in-class performance from antenna in to data out. The Peregrine UltraCMOS product portfolio achieves new milestones in monolithic integration, linearity, ultra-low power consumption and value, and showcases CMOS achievements including cellular handset switches and 13 GHz rad-hard prescalers.

Peregrine’s product portfolio is comprised of a complementary mix of products for the RF Wireless, Broadband RF, Space, Defense and Avionics markets. These high-performance devices address the mixed-signal functions of RF systems with unparalleled performance in linearity, broadband performance, scalability and integration. Monolithic integration is paramount to engineering unique product solutions, and only UltraCMOS™ technology provides the foundation upon which to deliver.